SUMMARY A device using a steam injection funnel is described by means of which air can be driven quickly and surely from an autoclave load. It is simple and inexpensive, necessitates no changes in the working routine of a microbiology laboratory, and does not interfere with the operation of the autoclave in its normal mode.While it is accepted that air must be removed from the chamber of a laboratory autoclave and from the interstices of its load if sterilization is to be attained, the means of achieving this with certainty are usually not so well understood. For a variety of reasons the method of air removal so effective in a porous load autoclave is not suitable, and reliance is usually placed on downward displacement of the heavier air by the lighter steam. When the load consists of material for discard, contained in, say, a stainless steel bucket, sterilisation will depend on the production of sufficient turbulence in the steam in the chamber to dispel the air from the bucket. Without such turbulence it is hard to see why the heavier air should ever be displaced, so that much thought has been given to maximising turbulence by varying the position of the chamber steam inlet and the shape and size of the baffle plate; by removing the baffle plate (Scruton, M.W., personalcommunication 1975); bycareful selection of thediscardcontainers; andeven by providing them with holes permitting the more easy escape of the air (Gillespie and Gibbons, 1975
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